


The Red Hands of the Ra Gada

by thelightofmorning



Series: Destiny of the Aurelii [1]
Category: Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death, Child Abandonment, Child Death, Corpses, Crimes & Criminals, Fantastic Racism, Genocide, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Imprisonment, Kidnapping, Multi, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Prequel, Religious Conflict, Sex Work, War Crimes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-06
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-12 16:35:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 6
Words: 10,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29887428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelightofmorning/pseuds/thelightofmorning
Summary: Beroc ibn Neelam al-Dragonstar is an Ansei, a diplomat and a nobleman of Hammerfell. It is his duty as a Forebear to take what is great about the foreign and put it to work for the Ra Gada so that the children of Yokuda-that-was might grow the stronger for it. That includes Rustem ibn Setareh al-Bruma, son of an old friend and a Redguard born far from home.Safia bint Beroc al-Elinhir is the newly raised Lady of Elinhir. As steel-willed as her father, she must use every court-trained wile and her own guile to protect Hammerfell from external and internal enemies. Rustem is exactly what she needs to secure her bloodline... and he is a good friend besides.Rustem has come home and found something worth fighting for. But when his past comes to haunt him, an enmity will be born that alters the history of Tamriel forever.Prequel to the new Aureliiverse 'canon'.
Relationships: Original Female Character/Original Male Character
Series: Destiny of the Aurelii [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2165382
Comments: 28
Kudos: 14





	1. An Accord

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading and reviewing. Trigger warning for death, violence, fantastic racism, corpse desecration, kidnapping, grief/mourning, religious conflict, imprisonment, war crimes, child abuse, rape/non-con, criminal acts, sex work, child abandonment and genocide. Part of the new ‘canon’ Aureliiverse. Gift for Felis79. For the curious, Rustem’s face-claim is Keith Hamilton Cobb as Tyr Anasazi in Gene Roddenberry’s ‘Andromeda’.

“I have had _enough_ of these factional disputes!” snapped Sura-Mai, son of Sura-Tor, son of Sura-Char. Every High King of Hammerfell bore the name Sura in honour of the demigod Avatar who saved them from utter domination by the Septim Empire. Some bore the name better than others. “If you haven’t noticed, we’re at war, and the Empire too weak to assist us. So the three factions will unite or we will all be annihilated by the Aldmeri Dominion.”

“I will lead the relief force for Hegathe,” promised Beroc, giving his sister’s son a deep nod. For political reasons, Sura-Mai was Lhotunic, the faction that tried to find middle ground between the traditionalist Crowns and the innovative Forebears. “I have just the agent to deploy.”

Sura-Mai’s shrewd eyes swung in the direction of the man next to Beroc. Rustem was bulkier than most of the Ra Gada, legacy of the Nord ancestry that gave him his gold-stained sea-blue eyes, and he preferred a two-handed bladed spear he called a naginata to the more typical dai-katana or katana of his Blades compatriots. His long coal-black hair was divided into multiple fine braids that hung to his waist, abhorrent to the clean-shaven and crop-haired Colovians who numbered among his ancestors, and his hands bore the freshly tattooed markings of one born under Satakal’s influence. Handsome and charming, the Blade had a horrified avoidance of command or commitment, but he was happy to deploy himself in accordance with Beroc’s wishes. There wasn’t much more that could be asked for in these dire times.

“Rustem ibn Setareh al-Bruma, your Majesty,” Rustem greeted in that rich, sensuous baritone. “I’m a Blade but I’m also a Forebear by grace of my mother’s blood.”

“So you are,” Sura-Mai agreed. “But where do you stand? The Blades provoked this war.”

“My father, the esteemed and utterly batshit insane Arius Aurelius, poked an aggressive bear and was surprised to see it start eating people,” Rustem answered grimly. “But the Thalmor would have come regardless. They want to end all the races of humanity and probably the other mer as well. They see the world as a prison they’re freeing us from.”

“They would destroy the Walkabout?” asked one of the Crowns, a na-Totambu named Kematu the First. “They deny Tall Papa himself?”

“They think the only gods that matter are theirs and most of their gods mourn Lorkhan’s plans,” observed Odeya, High Priestess of Mowhra. “We didn’t let the Left-Handed Elves drive us from these shores and neither shall these black-and-gold mer be allowed to do the same. The Hands of Mowhra will stand with the Children of Satakal in defying the Dominion.”

There was a rumbling among the other priests gathered in the throne room. Beroc let the clerics deliberate among themselves and looked across the chamber. Sentinel was relatively untouched by the war, as was his fiefdom of Dragonstar or his daughter’s Elinhir, but too many faces were still missing and Sura-Mai had stripped the white granite chamber of its gold and silks to pay for the war effort. Once comfortably plump as a rug merchant in Stros M’kai, he was leaner and harder, living as frugally as an Alik’r tribesperson to devote every extra resource to throwing out these invaders.

“The Order of Diagna stands with you,” promised the priest of said hoary, near-forgotten god.

“So too shall the sword-singers. I think it is no coincidence we have three Ansei, all of whom have rediscovered the blades forged from our souls, in these dark days,” agreed the High Priest of Leki, a man who called himself Nimcha after his favourite weapon. “Beroc is well suited to lead the force. He knows words can be a field of combat too.”

“You drummed that into me with the flat of your nimcha,” Beroc said wryly as all eyes swung to him. “Rustem will take the remnant Blades and our more warlike Children of Satakal to harry the forces and execute as many officers as possible. I am told there are at least two thousand Legionaries who have been ‘released’ on sick leave because of the Imperial retreat to Cyrodiil.”

“They’ve already joined me under the command of Legate Vignar Grey-Mane. He’s a Nord, but he’s royally pissed with the Empire and the rumblings of agreeing to the banning of Talos to buy themselves peace,” Rustem said with a nod. “Even if we win here, Mede’s put us in a bad position because the stupid bastard wasn’t prepared. The Blades warned him but he ignored us… and now I have family that might pay for it if Cloud Ruler falls.”

Sura-Mai’s expression tightened. “Mede’s shortcomings are blatant. If the Empire wins this war, it’s because of General Jonna, not because of the esteemed Emperor.”

He waved a hand. “To work, all of you. Time runs short.”

After making their bows and farewells to the High King, Beroc led Rustem to a secluded courtyard, where a single cedar tree lent its resinous scent to a garden as heartbreakingly beautiful as the summer sunset over Dragonstar. Only those of royal blood could see this garden… and for all his flaws, Rustem had that twice over. The Blade leaned his naginata on the white marble fountain and inhaled the fragrance of frangipani, hibiscus and jasmine. This was normally a place where the royal consorts meditated or held private audiences, but there hadn’t been a royal consort since Sura-Mai’s mother Aliya. Sura-Tor had never gotten over Setareh’s decision to try and be an Empress over a mere Queen.

“Your mother loved this garden,” Beroc said suddenly, struck by the pensive expression on the younger Forebear’s face. “She could have been Queen.”

“So I’ve been told,” Rustem answered. “But you didn’t invite me here to admire the flowers. What do you want, Beroc?”

“Safiya needs a consort, one who won’t try to usurp her power as Lady of Elinhir,” Beroc admitted. “You aren’t attached, I gather, and that would please her.”

“I’m still technically married,” Rustem pointed out.

“’Technically’,” Beroc repeated dryly. “I believe you and Sigdrifa are quite estranged by now.”

“We are,” he confessed. “We… weren’t a good match. But when Arius Aurelius tells you to do something, you do it, because he can make you die of fear… or get my dear little brother to stab you as a traitor.”

He turned to study the cedar tree, a jewel of its kind hung with tiny stone globes filled with magelights. “We have plans to deal with him. I’ve agreed to lend a hand in return for being freed of my marriage. Delphine owes me for her promotion and we were lovers. She’ll agree.”

“You would betray your own father?” Beroc asked softly. The complicated politics of the Aurelii were something he struggled to comprehend.

“I would avenge my mother,” Rustem said softly. “She gave birth to Irkand and Arius discarded her as no longer useful… probably because she planned to be rid of him as a burden on the Blades.”

Beroc closed his eyes in renewed grief. Setareh had been a jewel of the Forebears, a cosmopolitan and clever woman who took what was great in other cultures and made it work for the Ra Gada. She’d been a friend who wanted to save them all from the uselessness of the Medes. And she’d been betrayed by the mad, paranoid Arius Aurelius.

“What would be your price for helping me?” he asked. “It might be that…”

“I want Callaina raised in Elinhir,” Rustem said immediately. “She’s sickly but I think half of that is Bruma’s lousy climate and Sigdrifa’s attempts to toughen her up. She’s got a knack for magic – she’s five and she can already cast Candlelight and Magelight – and the City of Mages would be a great place for her.”

When Safiya asked Beroc to bring her request to Rustem, he’d thought it was because of the bloodlines that the feckless Blade brought. But now he realised his daughter had looked past the Daedra-may-care attitude to the decent father within.

“I will do everything in my power to make it so,” Beroc promised quietly. “But first, we must save Hegathe.”

Rustem nodded and Beroc knew an accord had been struck.


	2. Never Forgive, Never Forget

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing. Trigger warning for mentions of death, violence, fantastic racism, war crimes, implied sexual intercourse, child death and child abuse. The first part is copy/pasted from ‘The Widening Gyre’ as it’s still relevant to this canon. Irkand is ‘canonically’ the Forgotten Hero of Elder Scrolls: Legends.

“Damn the Empire. Damn them all.”

For Beroc, a consecrated priest of HoonDing and the third-highest nobleman in Hammerfell, to swear so vehemently meant whatever news had been delivered by the courier was bad. Rustem rested his naginata across his shoulders and sauntered across the courtyard of his daughter’s palatial birch home in Elinhir. That kind of tone indicated someone needed to die – and Rustem was very good at making that happen.

The Lord of Dragonstar glanced up from the scroll. “Good. You’re here. I won’t need to send a manservant to the Rusty Cup this time around.”

“Just send someone who isn’t so stuck up and he’ll be fine,” Rustem pointed out. The Rusty Cup was a rough place, to say the least, but it was popular with the ‘medically discharged’ veterans of the March of Thirst who were on leave. They sold a rough wine but a fine ale imported from Skyrim.

“I’d be inclined to send Titus Mede there and tell the soldiers what he’s done,” Beroc said grimly. “He’s betrayed us and he’s betrayed the Nords.”

They entered the home and were immediately met by Safiya, a delicate Redguard woman whose fine features belied the steely glint in her brown eyes. She was the better parts of Sigdrifa and Delphine combined with a calm acceptance of people that both women lacked. “Sura-Mai’s here,” she said bluntly.

“Of course he is. Titus Mede has soiled himself in the face of the Aldmeri Dominion and is using our honour and that of the Nords to wipe himself,” Beroc answered bluntly.

“That might the politest way I’ve ever heard someone describe the Emperor shitting himself,” Rustem observed. “Is it literal or metaphorical?”

“Both.” Sura-Mai, High King of Hammerfell, emerged from the solar where the weavers worked in more peaceable times. He was softer and younger than Beroc, his maternal uncle, and shared the delicate features of his cousin Safiya. At first glance, he looked like a carpet seller than a king. “Rustem ibn Setareh, where does your allegiance lie?”

“Not with the Empire,” Rustem assured him. “I’m guessing the Dominion ground him down into banning Talos worship, which not only screws the Nords over but puts the Blades in a very bad place.”

“The Blades are dead,” Safiya said softly. “Your father tried to seize the Pale Pass and the Legion commander there allowed the Thalmor to flank Cloud Ruler Temple. All were killed in the brief siege or by crucifixion afterwards. We have no word on your wife but our agent indicated your daughter Callaina is believed dead.”

“That. Fucking. Fool,” Rustem hissed. “That Satakal-damned…”

He mostly remembered Callaina as a big-eyed girl who avoided her mother like the plague because Sigdrifa was trying to make her a warrior when she wanted to be a mage. There had been nebulous plans to remove his father, divorce Sigdrifa so they’d both be the happier for it, and bring Callaina to Elinhir where the drier climate would be good for her lungs and the Mages’ Academy good for her talents. Those plans were done for now.

Sura-Mai looked startled. “You swear by Satakal?”

“I certainly don’t swear by Talos,” Rustem said flatly. “I’ve seen nothing but grief come from the name of Talos.”

Safiya nodded. “You were correct about the worship of Talos being banned. But that isn’t the worst of it. Mede has ceded southern Hammerfell to the Aldmeri Dominion in order to save his throne.”

No wonder Beroc looked ready to tear Mede’s throat out by the teeth.

“We, of course, have no intentions of agreeing to this,” Sura-Mai said gravely. “You are considered the default commander of the Legion veterans who fight alongside us. Do you think they will stand for this?”

“Most of them won’t,” Rustem said, wiping his eyes. Callaina was in the Far Shores, because he didn’t think a sick Nord child would go to Sovngarde – and she’d be miserable besides if she did. “But if we don’t surrender, you know the war will continue, right?”

“We’re counting on it,” Sura-Mai promised. “Now the protection of Cyrodiil is no longer our main concern, we can turn all our forces and attention to removing this elven infection.”

“Alas, most of the Imperial officers in Hammerfell will have tragic deaths at the hands of the elves,” Safiya added. “Some of them may even die at elven hands.”

Rustem managed to drag a smile from the depths. “I doubt I’m here because of my good looks and charming personality.”

“You have those?” Safiya asked.

“You certainly didn’t pick me as your lover because of my fidelity,” he pointed out.

“No. As Lady of Elinhir, I required virility, not fidelity,” was her serene answer.

One thing that Safiya possessed that neither Delphine nor Sigdrifa did not was common sense.

“We have need of you,” Sura-Mai said. “There is a long plan ahead of us. Will your wife be offended if you were to divorce her and formalise your union with Safiya?”

“Sigdrifa? She’ll probably send a thank you note to the wedding, assuming she can escape the Thalmor.” Rustem leaned on his naginata. “But why am I needed? I can do stud duty for an heir.”

“One of my cousins will inherit,” Safiya told him. “But we need to unite the bloodlines of Cyrus the Restless and his sister Iszara. If you need some time to mourn your daughter, I understand. But it must be done in the next few years.”

“The bloodlines of the Hero of Kvatch and the Redguard who told Tiber Septim to go fuck himself,” Rustem said softly. “What are you playing at?”

Beroc’s expression was opaque. “The destruction of the Mede family. Our honour demands no less.”

Rustem smiled thinly. “Satakal swallow the bastard.”

…

Safiya accepted a cup of beer from Rustem after their morning exertions and sipped the bitter brew appreciatively. She’d always been partial to wine but with her consort’s preference for ale and other yeasty brews, she was developing a taste for them just as he developed a taste for the finer things in life. Blades seemed to waver between austerity and hedonism, in particular the survivors of Wind Scour Temple who’d been succoured by Hammerfell. No weapon should go to waste.

Rustem was unusually brooding today and Safiya, trained in reading the most recalcitrant stone-faced Cyrod, knew he was thinking of his daughter Callaina. “I’m sorry,” she said gently, touching one powerful olive-bronze arm. “It happened before our agent could extract her.”

“It isn’t that,” he said over his shoulder, giving her the bright empty smile that hid his pain. “I know you and Beroc did your best. If Arius hadn’t been so damned deluded and paranoid…”

“Our agent tried to prevail on your brother to assist him, but Irkand was noncommittal until his capture by the Thalmor,” Safiya admitted with a sigh. “I suppose he didn’t trust Falion.”

“Falion, the necromancer?” Rustem turned around to face her fully. “ _He_ was your agent?”

“Yes. He’s very competent.” Safiya managed a wry quirk of her lips. “He was dealing with Lu’ah al-Skaven and her renegade Priests of Tu’whacca and agreed to try and rescue a gifted mage. It… well, Irkand… well…”

“Irkand,” Rustem said tightly, his every word etched with hate, “has accepted Mede’s pardon for ‘unspecified services to the Empire’ not a week after Cloud Ruler Temple fell. Two Blades managed to cross over into Hammerfell to warn Wind Scour of the danger.”

Safiya dropped the wooden cup in horror, beer spilling across the sheets. “No! Truly?”

“Truly.” Rustem inhaled shudderingly. “He had every reason to hate me, Safiya. I took his lover. If he’d cut a deal to save Callaina, I could have understood. She was innocent of our family’s madness. But to roll over and show his belly…? I wonder what he got from it.”

“It wasn’t him who betrayed Cloud Ruler. Irkand was reliably reported in the Emperor’s camp just before the Battle of the Red Ring.” The reports concerning the exact events of the days leading up to said battle were sketchy and conflicting: Mede was terribly wounded, Mede had led the soldiers who executed Lord Naarifin wielding Goldbrand, Mede had sacrificed Bruma to appease the Thalmor and destroy his enemies in one fell swoop… But whatever Irkand’s sins – and they were many – Safiya couldn’t lay this one at his feet.

“Who then?” Rustem growled. “Your intelligence is better than mine. What does Falion say?”

“A messenger came from Falkreath and not two hours later, the commander of Fort Pale Pass was withdrawing troops from Bruma as the Aldmeri Dominion marched in, catching the Blades by surprise.” Safiya sighed and rose to her feet, peeling beer-wet sheets from her body. “Falion had to cross the border using the Serpent’s Trail – the Thalmor have a high bounty on his head. He couldn’t get to the ruins for three days afterwards and according to the word in Bruma, Callaina was crushed when the roof collapsed during a Thalmor battlemage bombardment.”

Rustem shuddered once. “Any word Of Sigdrifa?”

“She’d been sent on a long-distance mission to rescue some Tongue, whatever _that_ is.”

“Ulfric, son of Hoag Stormcloak, Jarl of Windhelm,” the ex-Blade replied automatically. “Probably jumped on the chance to flee Cloud Ruler. But dammit, why couldn’t she have sent Callaina to her father in Falkreath?”

“Because,” Safiya said gently, “Falion scried that the messenger that alerted the Legion commander wore Falkreath colours.”

_“What?”_ Rustem demanded angrily.

“He can’t be certain but the messenger was definitely a Nord and Dengeir had expressed his displeasure with the Aurelii over Sigdrifa’s treatment by you and Arius,” Safiya told him. “Until he comes to Elinhir, I won’t have the full picture.”

“Son of a bitch. I’ll pike his head at the gates of Falkreath when I get the chance,” Rustem promised softly. “Sure, send someone after me. But to punish Callaina…”

For the first time she’d ever seen it, Rustem began to cry, and Safiya sat back down in the beer-soaked mess to hold him. This man, who had been a means to an end, had unexpectedly become her friend and she owed him some comfort… and vengeance.

“We will avenge them all,” she promised softly. “Ra Gada never forgive and we never forget.”


	3. The Second Treaty of Stros M'kai

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing. Trigger warning for death, violence, fantastic racism, corpse desecration, war crimes, religious conflict and mentions of child death and attempted sexual assault. Marius is sometimes not a nice person, I fear, and he likes to make his enemies suffer.

“Dear gods,” breathed Kematu the First. “Rustem ibn Setareh did all of _this_?”

“This” was the man-high cairn of Altmer skulls, boiled clean and bleached white, located at the Alik’r Gate of Elinhir. Rustem had certainly kept the Priests of Tu’whacca busy with his work and helped drive the Dominion forces south of the Alik’r Desert. Now they were begging for a truce, one that Sura-Mai intended to cost them as dearly as possible. Southern Hammerfell was impoverished, northern Hammerfell was depleted, and all factions were tentatively cooperating in a rare show of unity. They needed peace more than the Dominion, peace enough to rebuild free of the Empire.

“Thalmor killed his daughter and father,” Beroc explained tersely. Not that Rustem mourned the loss of Arius but no one needed to know that. Crowns were all about family and lineage.

“I heard about that,” Kematu admitted. “I suppose it’s an appropriate – if grisly – means of chastisement. I’d have returned the heads myself.”

“As would I, but the Dominion is disturbed by the desecration of Altmer corpses and Rustem knows how to fight a war on more than one front,” Beroc agreed.

“Don’t they raise Dominion dead?”

“Only the Bosmer and Khajiit.”

“Charming.”

Safiya was holding court in her grand hall today, the birch-and-tile room in the cool greens, greys and pastels she preferred. Kematu inclined his head to her as an equal – Alik’r Crowns considered themselves the equal of any outside Forebear noble – and slanted a nervous gaze in Rustem’s direction. Today, he wore crimson and rust robes that looked uncomfortably like streaks of drying blood, his naginata adorned with tassels of sage green and cream in deference to Safiya. Beroc’s daughter was teaching him well.

Kematu frowned when Safiya didn’t rise… but she was Lady here and Beroc could only expect her to tolerate so much arrogance from a Crown. “Father,” she greeted warmly. “What brings you and Kematu the First here?”

“The Dominion are suing for peace and the conference shall be held in Stros M’kai,” Beroc told her. “Sura-Mai requires the pair of you there.”

Rustem’s grin was cold. “So I’m the stick then?”

“They’re absolutely terrified of you,” Kematu told him. “I’ve heard you compared reliably to Pelinal Whitestrake.”

“I don’t have his anger management issues and I don’t hate all elves,” Rustem answered. “I’ll come along. I’d like the time and space to pursue my other grudge and killing mer is getting tedious.”

“We intend to formally declare ourselves independent of the Empire,” Kematu announced, looking at Safiya. “Mede has betrayed us.”

“He has betrayed many people,” Safiya said calmly. “And he will answer for it.”

Now she rose to her feet. “Come. You must be tired and famished. Refresh yourselves – we have a meal prepared for you.”

After a nice cool bath and donning clean robes, Beroc felt a little less than his fifty-seven years as he entered the dining chamber, reserved for small but important meals. Safiya preferred a cool elegance to her furnishings in the greater chambers, creating light and space that projected a timeless austerity, but the smaller ones were always examples of intimate opulence. _“Luxury is less obvious – and easier to create – in smaller spaces,”_ she once told him with a laugh.

Kematu looked a little more gratified as he lounged on a linen cushion, clad in robes of saffron and blue, a ball of sesame seeds and almond paste rolled in honey between his fingers and a cup of sweet Stros M’kai rum at his other hand. Neelam, Beroc’s third cousin’s child, was serving as handmaiden and keeping the Crown’s cup and plate full. Kematu would be treated as well as he’d be in his own tent, every preference – within reason – catered for. The one Crown who thought the handmaidens were meant to serve more intimate purposes no matter their will wound up separated from lunch and dinner by Rustem’s very messy dismemberment.

Rustem had also changed his robes into brilliant sea-blue and crimson, his braids tied back neatly and the tattoos on his hands flashing scarlet as he told the story of how he decapitated a Dominion commander at Hegathe with expansive gestures. He’d embraced Forebear tradition, building on the base Setareh managed to instil in him, and even Crowns who were personally offended by the existence of Redguards with non-Yokudan ancestry grudgingly conceded he respected the ancient ways. When Beroc asked him once why he threw himself into them, the assassin simply replied, “I’ve come home.”

Beroc sighed inwardly. If Setareh had the raising of him, Rustem would have been a mighty lord indeed. While a few years – and discussions with the Priests of Mowhra – had made him more capable of accepting commitments and commands, he still shied away from leadership in a civilian capacity. Oh well. It meant he would never challenge Safiya for authority.

He took a seat, smiling at the others, and accepted a cup of wine from Dalila, an older cousin from Sentinel who’d once been Queen Aliya’s chief handmaiden. “I apologise for the tardiness,” he said ruefully. “It’s been weeks since I had a good bath.”

“Don’t worry,” Kematu said breezily. “I was finding the story of Lord Alondil’s execution highly entertaining. So much for Aldmeri superiority when one whines without dignity for one’s life.”

“I do enjoy that look of ‘it cannot be’ just before I prove that yes, it can be,” Rustem agreed with a laugh.

Beroc nodded with a chuckle and sipped from his wine. Let the Aldmeri Dominion hear of Crown, Forebear and Lhotunic laughing about their soldiers’ demises. It would show them how hard it would be to defeat a united Hammerfell.

If they could just stop the old factional rivalries from re-emerging after the peace was made.

…

Ondolemar strode up the steps to the King’s palace in Stros M’kai, stopping and looking over his shoulder as Nurancar helped his wife Elenwen make her wheezing way up. Pity, he’d hoped to invoke a breathing attack. He’d have to settle for her face being an unhealthy shade of orange instead.

Beroc, one of Sura-Mai’s uncles and the king’s right-hand Forebear, waited with patient dignity at the top of the steps. Clad in the dull scarlet and pale violet of Dragonstar, he carried the Soul Sword of A’Tor, as was his right as royalty and a Sword-Saint. Ondolemar fancied he could see the lean, saturnine figure of a Redguard prince beside him but it was probably his imagination.

Most of the actual negotiations had been completed before they’d arrived to sign the Second Treaty of Stros M’kai but Elenwen – once she was able to speak – insisted on going through all of the provisions as Beroc led them through the sandstone halls to the Great Hall. She was hoping to wring some kind of advantage from them despite the fact that Sura-Mai, Kematu the First, Safiya of Elinhir and Beroc had essentially taken the Dominion out into the alleyway, punched it in the stomach, kicked it into the curb and then rifled through its pockets for valuables. Where the Cyrods had barely survived a war of attrition and still been forced to sign a humiliating treaty, the Redguards had united and barely broken a sweat in defeating the army within their borders.

“Look at it this way,” Ondolemar murmured to a glum Nurancar, “They’re still breaking from the Empire.”

Nurancar, the Butcher of Bruma, grunted sourly. “Why do you always look on the sunny side of things? We were slaughtered and now we must simper around these wretched…”

“Always look on the bright side of life,” Ondolemar said cheerfully just before they entered the Great Hall.

“I hate you,” Elenwen wheezed.

Marius, tucked deep within Ondolemar, returned the feeling with interest.

Tellingly, none of the Redguards rose to their feet when the trio of Aldmeri entered. Sura-Mai was resplendent in cloth-of-gold and brilliant scarlet silk but absolutely no mer paid attention to the soft, delicate, somewhat ordinary man when the absolute nightmare that was Rustem Aurelius lounged against the wall with naginata in hand. Ondolemar had to give the man credit for style because he’d tied every golden rank-mark from every Thalmor officer he’d killed to his naginata in a long chiming string that reached from blade to butt of the bladed spear.

“That man is a murderer!” Nurancar burst out in rage. “What is he doing here?”

“He’s no worse than the mer who ordered the deaths of children and civilians,” Safiya of Elinhir, clad in peach-and-rose robes, observed coolly from her seat. “Poor little Callaina deserved better than what you and your charming wife gave her, I’m sure.”

Elenwen went a dangerous shade of copper again and Ondolemar savoured her rage before clearing his throat. “She died quickly when the roof collapsed at Cloud Ruler Temple,” he repeated for the umpteenth time. “I buried her – and the other innocents of Cloud Ruler Temple – myself. War is a terrible thing but there is no reason to be cruel in the waging of it.”

“The treaty,” Sura-Mai said pointedly. “You will sign it and then every one of you Thalmor filth will leave my kingdom, never to return.”

Nurancar spluttered. He’d gotten used to the grovelling fear of the Cyrods. Elenwen’s look promised retribution. As for Ondolemar-

Ondolemar picked up a quill and signed it after Elcano, the chief negotiator, did the same. “I assure you, my lord, the Dominion will seek no conflict with Hammerfell for many, many years to come,” he said, praying they heard the implied warning in his words.

It was all he could do – watch, wait and warn. He prayed it would be enough.


	4. Motherhood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing. Trigger warning for death, violence, fantastic racism, corpse desecration and mentions of religious conflict, war crimes, sexual intercourse, sex work, child death and grief/mourning.

It wasn’t until she gave birth to Cirroc that Safiya truly understood why she strived for a Hammerfell free of the Empire. Oh, she had supported her family and lent whatever aid to Rustem and her father’s desire for vengeance was needed, but it took looking into her son’s eyes and imagining an Imperial yoke around his neck that made the cause personal. Cirroc would never be some Cyrod’s weapon or scapegoat. Not while she breathed.

She watched Rustem feed the newborn, supporting his head gently as he’d learned, surprisingly tender for a man who so often killed and whose only loves seemed to be slaying his enemies and defying authority. Cirroc gripped his wrist and her consort laughed gently. “You’ll be a sword-saint one day,” he said with a smile. “Greater than even your grandpa.”

“And what will I do for an heir?” Safiya asked him amusedly.

“Pick one of your cousins. They run the place already,” was his suggestion, delivered with a fond smile.

It had become apparent from the beginning that Rustem was disinterested in love of a romantic sort, which was somewhat disappointing as what woman didn’t dream of a dashing warrior who swept her off her feet and carried her away to a lifetime of bliss? But Safiya prided herself on her practicality and while Rustem didn’t love her as a wife, they liked and respected each other, with plenty of passion in the bedchamber when neither of them dallied with a carefully chosen lover. He carefully avoided married women, maidens in search of a husband and anyone who was looking for more than a good time; she chose her lovers among the ranks of her male warriors, all of whom were discreet and disinclined to challenge Rustem for the position of consort. His skill as a warrior was too respected and his lack of power in the running of things too apparent for any of them to risk death. It was a good arrangement, if a little lonely.

Neelam, her chief handmaiden and bodyguard, arrived at the door with Dalila and Oyoke, an Alik’r shaman who sometimes ventured into Skyrim. “We have intelligence from Windhelm,” she reported. “It’s as you feared.”

Safiya looked over at Rustem, who was still feeding Cirroc, and nodded in the direction of her study. No need to rile up Rustem’s formidable temper just yet, not when he already had two grudges on his plate. Besides, some things were better served cold and with great patience.

Like the rest of her private quarters, the study was simple yet opulent with its waxed birch furniture, soft pastel furnishings and everything made for supreme comfort. Each of the women took a cushion around a table on which tea, cakes and wine were already placed; Safiya’s servants were trained in such niceties as it flattered a guest even before they realised it. That it pleased her friends was a pleasant bonus.

“My nephew, the one outcast for slaying his chief, joined the Dark Brotherhood recently,” Oyoke said without preamble after a gulp of wine. Her saffron and indigo robes were still dusty from travel; the news she carried so important that she eschewed proper amenities before reporting to the one who paid for her magical studies. “He was troubled, as a Son of Satakal should be, of an attempt to swallow the worldskins of innocents in the desire to make a lie reality.”

Oyoke’s nephew Nazir had been a promising sword-singer candidate until he slew his chief for getting two warriors killed through negligence. Safiya understood why and helped smuggle him to Skyrim in return for a tighter allegiance from Oyoke. The Alik’r Crowns were strict about the lawful ways of removing a bad tribal chief and publicly bisecting the man at the new moon gathering of several clans wasn’t one of them. Even if Rustem himself had been impressed at Nazir’s style.

_My consort does have a preference for dismemberment,_ she thought ruefully as she contemplated the shaman’s hidden meaning.

Several months ago, just before the signing of the Second Treaty of Stros M’kai, a new servant had poisoned the breakfast porridge and it was only by Rustem’s keen nose no one had perished. Safiya had allowed word of an attempted Aldmeri plot leak out while she investigated other avenues, one of which involved a vengeful still-technically wife who had reasons to conceal the truth. Assassination was always a risk in international politics but this was beyond the pale by anyone’s standards. She could forgive an attempt on herself and Rustem, but on the entire household…?

No, the Stormsword had made for herself a dire enemy, simply because she clung to a lie that no longer served its purpose.

“As he should be. The Dark Brotherhood have descended into common thugs after the fall of Cyrodiil,” Neelam said disgustedly. Like Rustem, she had been born under Satakal’s influence and therefore an assassin as need be. But she preferred to be a bodyguard because it was a more challenging role. “No Listener, no other Sanctuaries…”

“Satakal swallows all things,” Dalila said philosophically. “Maybe it is their time.”

“For this, it might very well be,” Safiya said grimly. “That such an insult has been wrought…”

“We’re not in a position to retaliate,” Dalila said bluntly. “Sigdrifa and her husband are a useful stalking horse that distracts the Empire from our goals. That means we must suffer them in silence… for now.”

Safiya ground her teeth in frustration but nodded in agreement. Dalila had served Aunty Aliya and so she knew much about politics. It wasn’t time to act now. But one day…

To distract herself, Safiya rose to her feet with a farewell to Oyoke, who would avail herself of hospitality before returning to the Alik’r. Falkreath would need to face some penalties, but they would be subtle, no doubt lost on Dengeir and his daughter. Pity the new Speaker of Falkreath was an ex-Shieldmaiden. Those women stuck together, it seemed.

Damn the Empire for existing and damn the Stormsword for not letting sleeping dogs lie.

…

Cirroc was toddling for short distances and eating soft solids when the Children of Satakal came for Rustem.

He blinked as the blindfold was removed. Before him stood a black basalt statue of a man with empty eyes and open mouth, tattered remnants of worlds gone at his feet. Lesser statues depicting a black hand and a dragon with baleful ruby eyes stood at his back.

“Satakal. The God of Everything,” announced the High Priest of Satakal. “World-Eater and World-Maker. The Void that the infidel call Alduin and Sithis and Padomai. The One Before and the One After. The One who eats the world so that a new one may grow in its place, as the serpent sheds the old skin to reveal a shining new one.”

Rustem bowed to the statue as he’d been taught.

“The Children of Satakal serve Him,” continued a masked woman in a light soprano. “Each life is a world entire. We swallow the lives of those who would choke the worlds of others, so that they may grow shining and new.”

Rustem bowed to the statue again.

“Do not swallow the worlds of the young, the mother, the innocent, the faithful,” added a third voice, alto or tenor, from a masked person of indeterminate gender. “Our hunger is endless, as is Satakal’s, but we are not ruled by it. As does Satakal devour the world-skins when time is due, so do we show restraint. We live through the gods and they live through us.”

Rustem bowed once more.

“Be welcome, Rustem ibn Satakal.”

Someone poured water that tasted of iron and copper over him.

“Be reborn, Rustem ibn Satakal.”

He was wrapped in a robe of red silk.

“Be known, Rustem ibn Satakal.”

Then he was turned to face the other Children of Satakal. Drums beat to the measure of his heartbeat as he was pushed through a gauntlet of clutching hands, women ululating as Safiya’s handmaidens had when Cirroc was born. He emerged into a sudden flare of light and cried out, someone catching him with gentle hands and laying him against her breast.

“You are home,” said the woman with the kindly voice. “You are the lull between the waves, the dark between the stars, the pause between the heartbeats. You are Rustem ibn Satakal… and you are My child.”

Darkness took him, wrapping around Rustem like a warm blanket, and he knew no more.

…

Setareh wrapped her son in a warm blanket and let him sleep off the initiation cup. It had been years since she held him, years of blood and sorrow and torment, and he’d grown into a strong warrior. But one who was wounded and damaged by Arius.

“That was not you speaking,” Hariq, the High Priest of Satakal, noted. “Something else used your voice.”

“I know,” she admitted with a sigh. “It wasn’t Molag Bal, if you’re wondering.”

“I think it was the Mother,” he said gently. “The kindliest face of Satakal… or Sithis, as some know him.”

She rose to her feet and followed the cleric out of the bedchamber. The Rusty Cup was a far from salubrious establishment, but it served its purpose for the Children of Satakal, and it served hot fresh blood that came from no animal for the discerning vampire. Since she’d have to return to Falkreath by dawn, she welcomed the kindness.

“Thank you for letting me see him,” she said quietly. “I failed him and his brother. I should have been cleverer.”

“No one expected the depths of Arius’ paranoia,” Hariq said grimly. “We thought… well, we thought wrong. But you are still with us, in a matter of speaking, and there are things you can still do for us… if you are willing.”

“I’m always willing,” Setareh promised. “Anything that lets me leave that boor Balgeir the Bloody for a few days is welcome.”

Hariq’s smile was thin. “So kill him.”

“You try killing a two-hundred-year-old vampire lord,” she retorted. “I’ll wring the blood from what’s left for breakfast.”

“Anything can die, so long as you are clever about it,” Hariq pointed out. “But Tall Papa’s priests have identified someone who needs to be protected, someone who’s close to Falkreath. There’s something dark stirring in the future and she needs to survive long enough to confront it.”

“Safiya?” Setareh asked.

Hariq shook his head. “No. Your granddaughter, in Bruma. A Moth Priest of my acquaintance tells me she is the Dragonborn that will confront Alduin, the rogue Nord aspect of Satakal. If the Empire finds out…”

Setareh allowed herself a grim smile. “Arius must be spinning in his grave. The Dragonborn of prophecy his own granddaughter!”

The priest gave her an opaque look. “He always knew. That’s why he used his Illusion to command her to survive no matter what.”

Setareh looked to the east, where the sun would rise. “She will survive. I will not fail this time.”


	5. Truce

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing. Trigger warning for mentions of death, violence, fantastic racism, incompatible mixed-orientation marriage, adultery and corpse desecration.

Nailing the Imperial Heir-Apparent’s corpse to a cross certainly informed the Empire that Hammerfell was well and truly free of them. As Lady of Elinhir and the nearest noble of note to the border with Skyrim, Safiya was in the political thick of things and sent out a flock of messengers bearing gifts, reminders of debts owed on either side, and assurances that Decimus Mede had it coming after ordering High King Sura-Mai to withdraw all troops on the southern coast. Condemnations and congratulations came in pretty messages and ornate gifts, bald statements and subtle insinuations. Sigdrifa Stormsword sent the offer of an alliance; Safiya sent a polite refusal. Even if Sigdrifa hadn’t tried to murder her household to cover up a former marriage, the Stormcloaks were all thunder and no lightning at the moment after their failed coup in Markarth.

“It’s not bluster,” Rustem said soberly after Safiya showed him the letter. “Sigdrifa’s got ultimate power in Eastmarch now as Ulfric’s imprisoned and Hoag’s on his deathbed. I’m betting a whole lot of ‘Imperial loyalists’ are going to have fatal accidents so she can consolidate her authority. For the first time in her life, Sigdrifa’s calling the shots. We better batten down the hatches in case she sends more assassins.”

But the Stormsword didn’t send an assassin. She sent an emissary, one who completely denied the existence of Sigdrifa and Rustem’s daughter in such an offensive manner that Safiya could hardly blame her consort for dismembering him. She abhorred waste and the loss of Callaina’s life to selfishness and madness and cruelty was certainly a great one. It had left a shadow on Rustem’s life that even raising Cirroc couldn’t erase.

Officially, Balgeir died because he’d abused some women in Elinhir. Unofficially, Safiya took pleasure in depriving the Kreathlings of their heir in private revenge for the assassination attempt.

It was Oyoke’s nephew Nazir who came to Elinhir, in disguise as a common mercenary, to alert the Children of Satakal that Sigdrifa wanted vengeance for her dead uncle and was trying to hire the Brotherhood to do the deed. “Ulfric’s out of prison now after swearing fealty to Istlod,” he reported after a swallow of ale from one of the Rusty Cup’s battered tin tankards. “The Imperials tried to take the children as ‘fosterlings’ but Sigdrifa sent her younger one to the Vigilants and Ulfric had the elder one fostered with the Companions of Jorrvaskr.”

Safiya accepted a cup from Jubal, the innkeeper, as Rustem popped the cork on an expensive ale from Skyrim. His tastes had refined, if not expanded, over the years they’d spent together. She was fine with that. “Sigdrifa started this. Balgeir was offensive to the women of Mowhra’s Pearl. The wrong is on her side.”

“Not by Nord standards. Astrid, our Speaker, considers Sigdrifa a personal friend because the Stormsword defended her right to remain in the Shieldmaidens despite not being a virgin.” Nazir sighed and drank some more ale. “She’s only held her hand because I pointed out the Children of Satakal are more powerful than the Brotherhood at the moment. You and Sigdrifa need to call a truce before you undermine everything and the only winners are those damned elves and the Empire.”

“You’re joking,” Rustem said flatly. “She let my daughter die!”

“She was nowhere near Cloud Ruler when it fell,” Nazir countered softly. “I won’t deny she isn’t a mother’s left teat but… she’s innocent of that. Blame Arius; I’ve heard stories about him.”

“Most of them are true,” Rustem growled. “Safiya?”

“I will meet with the Stormsword if she is brave enough to come to Falkreath,” Safiya said simply. “She tried to kill me; I want to see her face.”

So it was two weeks later both of them met in a small Nord ruin in the no man’s land between Orsinium (which Safiya recognised as an independent kingdom), Skyrim and Hammerfell. Beroc and Rustem accompanied Safiya while Sigdrifa had Ulfric and Galmar with her.

The Stormsword was hard rather than strong, more inclined to break rather than bend, and many of her mannerisms – the intensity of her focus, her seemingly icy demeanour and the minute repetitious movements – reminded Safiya of Cirroc. Black-haired and austere in appearance, she wore her bear-carved armour comfortably, her aqua eyes pale and cold as sea-ice. Her husband was wheat-blond and as sharply brittle as broken glass; Galmar was ice-blond and wore bearskins, his body language indicating loyalty to Ulfric. Interesting, to say the least.

“I made a mistake,” she said before Safiya could open her mouth.

“Only one?” Rustem asked acidly.

“When you are perfect, you can condemn her,” Ulfric rumbled, his voice edged with some kind of power. “We came here to meet you as we have mutual enemies who would win if Hammerfell and Skyrim fought. I, for one, am willing to consider the matter settled. Balgeir was a fool and a beast… by Nord honour, killing him was perhaps excessive for the stated reason, but he could have explained the situation better.”

“Where does sending an assassin to poison an entire household stand in _Nord honour_?” Safiya asked quietly. “Sending one after me and Rustem, well, that’s just politics. But to threaten the lives of everyone… as you said, Stormsword, ‘you made a mistake’.”

“I acted hastily,” Sigdrifa admitted. “Hoag was… a traditionalist. A divorced Shieldmaiden would have been no worthy bride for his only son, no matter the political and practical reasons, and we’d already told him I’d never been married in the first place. When I heard Rustem was in Hammerfell, near the border, I… called on an old friend.”

“I was new to the role and thought an accident was a good idea,” said a sweetly poisonous voice from the shadows, a glint of eye betraying another woman in the room. “We made mistakes, Safiya. No one died, right?”

“Only the assassin,” Beroc said gravely. “So you’re saying you’re willing to consider the death of Balgeir as ‘bloodgeld’ for the attempted assassination attempt?”

“Yes,” Ulfric said.

“For fuck’s sake, really?” Rustem asked. “What about Callaina, hmm? You pretended she never existed, dammit!”

“She was dead and I wanted to believe none of my damned marriage ever happened!” Sigdrifa retorted in her harsh, unlovely soprano. “I could have forgiven the adultery, Rustem, if you hadn’t blatantly humiliated me in front of our families!”

“I was trying to get you to initiate a divorce so we could both be free!” he yelled back. “Arius wouldn’t let me even though I begged. Said it would insult Dengeir. I thought you’d be able to do something but you didn’t.”

“Because he threatened to kill me if I shamed my father like that,” Sigdrifa countered harshly. “I lived with ten years of fear, Rustem Aurelius, while you got to gallivant around dipping your wick in every pool of wax that crossed your path!”

“I ran away because he wanted me to be the perfect Colovian!” he snarled in return. “I would have gone along with it, Sigdrifa, if you’d just fucking asked me! Delphine and I, Acilius and Esbern, were planning to murder the old bastard so we could save the Blades! Shame he got the bright idea to try and take the Pale Pass when the rumours of the White-Gold Concordat reached him!”

“We can play the blame game for as long as we wish and get nowhere,” her father finally said with a sigh. “Both of you failed in that marriage. Both of you hurt the other. For the sake of the daughter you must avenge, perhaps it is best to bury the _bloody_ hatchet?”

For Beroc to curse indicated great frustration on his part. Safiya admired her father’s restraint at times.

Ulfric and Galmar exchanged glances. “That’s the thing,” growled the latter. “One of our agents told me he saw a girl in Bruma who looked almost like the Stormsword, about seventeen or eighteen years of age, in the Synod chapterhouse. He thought she was one of Balgeir’s bastards – Talos knows he spread them around half of southern Skyrim and northern Cyrodiil – but he told me her name was Laina.”

Safiya allowed herself a startled curse. “My agents could not find anything! Before the fall of Cloud Ruler, we even tried to enlist Irkand to get her over to Elinhir, where her magics would have been welcome at the Academy. It was Rustem’s price for fighting for Hammerfell.”

“Irkand was too busy saving himself to care about that,” Sigdrifa said flatly. “And why would you care? It’s not like you’re married or it would serve you.”

“Because it was the right thing to do,” Safiya said simply. “Shieldmaidens know nothing of family, I’m told. For that, Sigdrifa, you have my pity.”

“Is this some kind of sick joke?” Rustem demanded. “I was told by a fucking Thalmor that she was dead because he buried her himself!”

“Ah yes, Ondolemar, the only honest Thalmor in existence,” Ulfric observed sarcastically. “This agent of mine is one of my best. He’s utterly honest with me.”

Safiya reached out and took Rustem’s hand, feeling the tremor in his fingers. “We will investigate ourselves. For this, you have bought your truce, Stormsword. Use it wisely.”

Sigdrifa’s fists clenched but in those pale eyes there were tears. “Oh, I will. One day, we will rule Skyrim… and we will remember those who assisted us.”

“It is no victory if it must be won by others’ efforts,” Beroc said calmly. “But we have always known this in Hammerfell, for the struggle is everything. Impress us and we will have you as allies. If not…”

“Oh, we will impress you,” Ulfric promised softly. “Even if it must take us decades.”


	6. The Ephemeral Feint

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing. Trigger warning for death, violence, fantastic racism and corpse desecration. Final chapter, made from the combined final chapters of the old ‘canon’ as not that much has changed.

“Dada! Look!”

Rustem was sitting in the courtyard of Safiya’s home, repairing the leather grip on his naginata, when Cirroc cried out for him to see something. He glanced up, expecting to see something like a new stone or a sword-dance the boy had practiced… and his jaw hit the ground in shock.

Cirroc, now a ten-year-old with Safiya’s delicate features and a lither build than Rustem, was holding out what looked like a club in his hands. Nothing unusual there, since Redguard children often wielded sticks as makeshift swords in their play. But it wasn’t a stick. It was an uneven, flickering bar of misty light that looked like weak winter sunlight concentrated into one place, balanced across Cirroc’s hands like the sword-singers did when they presented their blades before a duel.

“Damn,” Rustem said hoarsely. “Looks like you’re going to be a Sword-Saint, kiddo.”

“I’m going to be the best!” Cirroc announced proudly. “I’ll find all the bad people and defeat them!”

Rustem rested his hand on his son’s mop of curly hair. “I’m sure you will, kiddo.”

That night, Safiya held a feast to celebrate the occasion, inviting the great and good of Elinhir. They dined on foods from four provinces prepared in the tangy, spicy style of the Alik’r tribes, sipped sweet wine and fine ale, and watched one of the visiting sword-singers perform such a virtuoso shadow-fight that one could almost see the ten enemies he fought. Though the Ansei were no longer as prolific as they were in the old days of Yokuda-that-was, there was usually two or three to every generation, and all of them were revered as the living treasures they were. All Redguards were warriors who wielded weapons as needed; but the Ansei made weapons of their souls, swords of will and intention.

Rustem was standing near the door to the garden, watching Cirroc follow the movements of Khurram, a sword-singer known for fighting with twin swords, when Beroc approached him. “We make all the plans in the world,” the old man, now in his seventies, remarked. “And in one swift movement, the heart of those plans destroys them.”

“I suppose Cirroc had to inherit something from me,” Rustem said, sipping from his goblet of ale.

“I suppose so!” Beroc laughed.

“He’ll make a good Sword-Saint.”

“Yes. But he was meant to be the Hidden Sword, as I was in my day.” Beroc shrugged loosely. “Before he goes to the monastery, he must be dedicated to one of the gods. I know you have your reasons for delaying. But that delay must come to an end.”

“Not Satakal,” Rustem said softly. “The God of Everything isn’t for him.”

“Agreed. Our Sword-Seer did a scrying before she came. ‘The sword that is Cirroc will be quenched between fire and frost’, she told me. ‘He will be pure of technique until that purity is shattered by the wolf-lords of the centre-city, but in that impurity shall he find victory’.”

“Well, that’s cryptic,” Rustem said lightly, though he felt a thread of ice snake its way down his spine. “What happened to ‘get your washing done today for tomorrow it will rain’?”

“Any seer who could see that clearly would be the wealthiest person in Hammerfell,” Beroc agreed wryly.

“Leki,” Rustem said after a mouthful of ale. “I mean, the purity of technique is pretty clear. He’s going to be a great warrior-monk but some mercenary or guard’s going to set him on his ass because his style is so pure. So let the Goddess of the Spirit Sword and the Aberrant Technique be his patron.”

Beroc smiled approvingly. “You have become one of us to see so clearly. Go fetch him. We might as well do it as once.”

The Temples of the Yokudan gods were always open, so it was no great trouble to being Cirroc to the Shrine of Leki and find a priest still awake to conduct the ceremony. “He’s a little late for this,” remarked the reed-thin older man as he donned his saffron robes.

“I thought we’d wait until he was of an age to show which god he was suited to,” Rustem admitted.

“He’s the lad who conjured the soul sword on his own,” Beroc told the priest. “I mean, I taught him the beginning steps, but he did it all on his own.”

“Ah.” Comprehension flashed across the priest’s face. “Yes, Leki will love this one.”

The sleepy, yawning Cirroc was smoked with herbs that smelt like bitter leaves and sand, anointed with oils used in the tending of weapons, and tattooed with the first sigil of Leki on the palms of his hands. Beroc had told Rustem that the herbs had painkilling and soporific effects, so Cirroc would barely feel a thing, and all priests knew enough of Restoration to immediately heal the tattoos.

The ceremony was just being finished off when a clipped tenor, rich with the accents of the na-Totambu, cut into the silence following the priest’s last blessing. “He’ll be needing this.”

A man, of medium height, with close-cropped black hair, warm ochre-brown complexion weathered from the elements, and a neat goatee threaded with grey exited the sanctum. He wore a white shirt and maroon vest tucked into grey pants and in his hands was a golden-hilted nimcha that held a presence more substantial than its slim blade would suggest.

Beroc was the first to kneel, then the priest who also pressed Cirroc’s shoulder down so that he knelt, and finally Safiya. Rustem bowed slightly but didn’t kneel. The Children of Satakal knelt to no one.

“Not yet, mind you. He needs to learn the rhythm and temper of steel and the spirit sword first,” continued the god called both Sura-HoonDing and Cyrus the Restless. “But when the time comes, when wings of black darken the sky and the world stands on the blade-edge, it will be time for him to wield the Soul Sword of Prince A’Tor.”

“My lord, that is a dire prophecy,” Beroc said quietly.

“Not as dire as what I’m not sharing with you, Beroc. In about a decade or so, things will be… interesting.” Cyrus placed the sword in Safiya’s hands, folding her fingers gently over it. “Mortals plan and Sep laughs. Gods plan and He laughs the harder.”

“So Cirroc’s some hero of prophecy?” Rustem asked. “I had an ancestor like that and it fell out poorly for him. I don’t want that for my son.”

“Martin Septim was an idiot. He should have lit the Dragonfires first and then worried about his coronation.” Cyrus shrugged slightly. “Cirroc is what Cirroc is – the Champion of the Yokudan Gods. We can’t allow the world to be shaped to the liking of other powers without having a hand in it.”

“My lord,” spoke the priest of Leki, “You speak of a war in heaven?”

“As above, so below. The Empire is bleeding out and Talos is putting up one hell of a fight to avoid dissolution. The powers of the Druadachs and the old Nord gods are stirring. When the Snow Tower lies broken, kingless, bleeding, that is the time Cirroc must go to Skyrim.”

The god was already turning back towards the sanctum. “Purity is a fine thing on the field of honour but in the arras, it is the skills of the assassin that changes the world. Remember, ‘A thrust is elegant, and a cut is powerful, but sometimes the right action is a head-butt’.”

Before they could say anything else, he was gone.

Beroc sighed explosively. “Well, that just proves what we need to do next.”

“What’s that?” Safiya asked as she cradled the Soul Sword like a babe.

“Time is now,” Beroc said grimly. “We must set our Ephemeral Feint into motion before the Empire even knows to strike.”

…

“Finally,” Rustem said with a grin. “Where do I start?”

“We’ve identified who’s trying to get Mede assassinated.”

“One of his many cousins?” Rustem asked, popping the cork on his ale.

“Yes,” confirmed Jubal, sipping from his own cup of wine. “Armand Motierre. He has plans of killing the Emperor and marrying the Imperial Heir.”

“Okay, that’s disgusting.”

“Agreed.” Jubal smirked. “We only have to look at the na-Totambu of Stros M’kai as to why cousin marriage is wrong.”

Even the Crowns in the room laughed. The nobility of Stros M’kai were descended from Iszara, sister to Sura-HoonDing, and tried to preserve that connection almost at all costs. It made them notorious even among their own faction.

“He’s trying to contact the Dark Brotherhood,” Jubal continued when the laughter died down.

“Under Astrid, they’ve gone from bad to worse. No Listener since Bravil, I’ve heard. No one knows where the Night Mother’s body is,” reported one of the other Children.

“Dawnstar,” reported another who worked as a sailor at times. “Cicero the Keeper – who I’m fairly sure is touched by Sheogorath – transported her body there.”

“The old Sanctuary,” Jubal confirmed. “That explains why Motierre hasn’t been able to contact them directly. No Listener, no Black Sacrament will work.”

“Well, damn,” Rustem said, taking another drink of ale. “What do we do now?”

No one answered because every window of the Rusty Cup suddenly became outlined in flame.

Rustem grabbed his naginata and cast Oakflesh, trying to clear the way to the door, but the door had been jammed from the outside. When Children tried to escape via window, they were pushed back inside by spears. Few of them had any affinity for sorcery and by the time Rustem had managed to stumble into the cellar, his throat closed from the smoke, most of the screaming had stopped. He welcomed the soft darkness taking him once more.

He awoke in the Temple of Mowhra, one of the priestesses rebandaging his burns. There were tears and rage in the healer’s eyes and by the end of his pallet, Cirroc was sitting facing the door, the Soul Sword in his hands. “Others?” he managed to rasp.

The silence from the pair of them said it all.

It wasn’t until several days later that Rustem discovered what happened. Gaius Maro the Elder, the bastard son of Mede himself, had gotten wind of the same rumours as the Children had and knowing the grudge the Redguard assassins held, sent agents to infiltrate a criminal gang to eliminate the danger. Since it wasn’t commonly known the Rusty Cup was the informal headquarters of the Children, the gang simply thought it was going to be the destruction of some property – and people – the owner found inconvenient. When they learned the truth, they handed the Penitus Oculatus agents over to Safiya themselves.

“The word is going out for those who have retired from the Children to take up their duties once more, but it will be a long time coming,” Beroc reported gravely as he sat by Rustem’s bedside in Safiya’s house.

Rustem coughed and spat into a bowl. “I’m… not good… at rebuilding.”

“We noticed,” Beroc said with a flash of humour.

Rustem returned the smile weakly. It hurt too much to chuckle at the moment. “Agents?”

“Sung like songbirds. Maro didn’t send his best and brightest.” Beroc sighed and shook his head. “We can do nothing. The Empire will just deny it. But they used Direnni Fire.”

That explained why the fire hadn’t died down.

“Motierre… still looking.” Every breath was torture. “He wants assassin… He’ll get one.”

“Rustem, you’re nowhere near ready to fight!” Safiya said from her place on the other side.

“Will be. By time… get… to Dawnstar.”

Beroc nodded. “Yes. The healers say the damage can be repaired. A long boat ride would be perfect for it, if you remember to take the medicines.”

“I could go,” Cirroc offered. “They attacked priests of the God of Everything. I’m a Champion of Satakal too.”

“NO!” Rustem shouted hoarsely. Then he spent the next few minutes coughing.

“No,” Beroc repeated. “This is your father’s fight, Cirroc. I suspect he’ll have to join the Brotherhood.”

“But-“

“There’s a werewolf in the Brotherhood but I don’t think anyone would call him a wolf-lord,” Safiya interrupted gently. “You are meant for other things, my son. Your father can fight his own battles still.”

No one mentioned that despite his great talent, Cirroc was still only a first-rank Ansei, still half-trained by the sword-singers’ standards.

“My fight,” Rustem rasped. “Will… swallow… Emperor’s… world-skin.”

“It was what you were ever born to do,” Beroc agreed. “Now heal. You can’t swallow if you can’t breathe properly.”


End file.
